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Friday Alert
Friday, July 18, 2008(Alliance for Retired Americans)
President Vetoes Medicare Bill;
Congress Quickly Overrides
Tuesday,
President Bush vetoed H.R. 6331, the “Medicare
Improvements for Patients and Providers Act of
2008”. Congress quickly acted to override
the veto; the House voted 383-41 (Roll Call No.
491) for the override, while the Senate voted
70-26 (Record Vote No. 177), with both chambers
achieving more than the two-thirds required to
pass Public Law No: 110-275. 153 Republican
Representatives defied the Bush Administration
to vote for the bill’s passage, 24 more than
for the legislation’s initial passing on June
24; 4 additional Republican Senators also voted
yes. Complete results of the House
override vote are available at http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2008/roll491.xml,
and the full the Senate results can be found at
http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&session=2&vote=00177.
Alliance members sent thousands of letters to Congress and submitted dozens of letters to the editor to ensure physicians continue to treat Medicare patients, low-income seniors receive extra assistance with health care costs, and Medicare Advantage programs will be reformed so that more money goes to seniors and not large corporations through the passage of H.R. 6331. “Through his misguided veto of the Medicare bill, President Bush once again reflexively sided with the special interests of the big insurance companies, rather than with seniors struggling to afford quality health care,” said Alliance President George J. Kourpias. “Thank you to all of the Alliance members who have tirelessly worked this past year to make sure your members of Congress knew how important this bill was, and that we will continue to watch them closely.”
Patients Buying Fewer Prescription
Drugs
The growth in prescriptions
filled by U.S. pharmacies is at its slowest in
at least ten years, as increasing health care
costs and a slowing economy are making
medication harder to afford. According to a
recent Wall Street Journal article,
the drug industry usually remains stable in
economic downturns, because patients still
require medicine. However, the number of
prescriptions filled in the second quarter of
2008 may have actually decreased, due to higher
numbers of Americans without health insurance
and “skyrocketing out-of-pocket drug costs”
putting the cost of some medications out of
reach. Patients are facing additional
burdens as the health care industry has forced
consumers to shoulder larger percentages of
many costs. A Kaiser Family Foundation study
found that for a “preferred drug” through a
tiered insurance plan, average co-payments rose
67 percent from $15 in 2000 to $25 in
2007. In fact, 23 percent of respondents
to a Kaiser foundation poll failed to fill a
prescription in the last year for cost reasons,
up from 20 percent in 2005. Additionally,
19 percent either skipped doses or split pills,
an increase from 16 percent in 2005.
Late Baby Boomers’ Retirement May
Be Hurt by Housing Market
Collapse
In the face of proposals
to cut or delay benefits for Social Security
and Medicare, the Center for Economic and
Policy Research (CEPR), a nonpartisan think
tank, warns Congress should “take into account
the financial situation of near retirees” who
could be almost completely dependent on Social
Security and Medicare benefits to support their
retirement. According to a CEPR report,
due the collapse of the housing bubble the
majority of people who were between the ages of
45 and 54 in 2004 will accumulate little or no
wealth by 2009. The CEPR looked at three
scenarios in which 2009 housing prices remained
the same, dropped 10 percent, or dropped 20
percent; even when prices remained the same,
the median household would have 24.7 percent
less than in 2004. In contrast, those who rent
their homes will have more in 2009 than in 2004
in all three scenarios. The combination of the
destruction of housing wealth with a low
personal savings rate may leave many near
retirees completely reliant on Social Security
and Medicare benefits during retirement. “With
the economy slowing, it is more important than
ever to ensure Social Security and Medicare
remain strong and available to retirees as they
were intended to be, rather than tools of
private companies left to the whims of the
markets,” said Alliance Executive Director
Edward Coyle.
U.S. Health Care System Falls
Short
According to a report
released this week by the Commonwealth Fund
Commission on a High Performance Health System,
a nonprofit research group in New York, U.S.
health care is the most expensive in the world,
but does not meet critical benchmarks for
quality, access, and other major performance
measures. While America spends twice as much
per capita on health care, it ranks lower than
most other industrialized nations on numerous
indicators of overall care; the U.S. score
averaged 65 out of 100 over 37 categories, and
fell to last for “preventing deaths through use
of timely and effective medical care.” As
health care costs increase and even the insured
face medical bills they cannot afford,
Americans also have less access to care than
they did a year earlier – an estimated 75
million people in the U.S. have either no or
inadequate health insurance. “As rising
costs make care even harder to afford, we must
work even harder to achieve a universal health
care system,” said Ruben
Burks, Secretary-Treasurer of the
Alliance.
Alliance Partners with Caregiver
Resource
The Alliance has joined
with Aging with Grace, a national eldercare
resources company, to bring members a solution
to their eldercare issues. An experienced
Aging with Grace Eldercare Specialist can
educate you on the eldercare options that are
most appropriate for your family or loved one,
coordinate contact between you and those
resources, and facilitate the initiation of
services such as in-home care, adult day care
or respite care or referral to a senior living
community. They help identify where you are in
your current caregiver situation, where you
need to be and then work to get you
there! To learn more about Aging with
Grace, visit www.agingwithgrace.net
or call toll free 866-570-8588.
Did You Know...
Several
recent studies indicate that older Americans
are generally happier than younger ones
(The Washington Post).